Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, left, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled allowing prayer before meetings in municipalities. (Lori Van Buren / Times Union) less

Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, left, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled ... more

Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, left, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled allowing prayer before meetings in municipalities. (Lori Van Buren / Times Union) less

Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, left, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled ... more

Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled allowing prayer before meetings in municipalities. (Lori Van Buren / Times Union) less

Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, an interfaith minister, says a prayer before the start of the City Council meeting at Schenectady City Hall on Monday, July 28, 2014 in Schenectady, N.Y. The Supreme Court ruled ... more

U.S. Supreme Court upholds the right of municipalities to conduct prayer before meetings

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A recent City Council meeting in Schenectady started like any other, with a prayer said by an invited guest. Done before the Pledge of Allegiance, the prayer — or what is more commonly called an invocation — has been offered here at the beginning of every meeting for the last six decades.

But the Rev. Moonhawk River Stone, an interfaith minister and therapist, had something else he wanted to address — acknowledging what he thought was the importance of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that ensures prayer conducted before government meetings is constitutional.

"Whether we call it prayer, or the setting of loving intentions for our meeting, there's a call upon the energy, the life force that binds us all as one," River Stone said. "That's all that matters."

The Supreme Court case grew out of a lawsuit filed by two citizens over prayers said before every Town Board meeting in Greece, Monroe County, a northern suburb of Rochester; the suit was brought largely because every person of faith offering the invocation was Christian.

The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the town, but in May the U.S. Supreme Court decided in a 5-4 vote that prayer has been an integral part of government business since the country's founding — as long as the prayers do not attempt to convert or denigrate others' beliefs. During Greece's first meeting after the decision earlier this month, town leaders agreed to allow an atheist to give the invocation.

Schenectady City Clerk Chuck Thorne researched the topic, and he said Schenectady City Council has been holding an invocation since at least 1952. For Schenectady, public comment periods are known to be lively and bring criticism for every manner of government function — from snow removal to the timing of red lights to the fact that the waste collection schedule is posted over people's faces during the public access broadcast of the public comment period. But no one can recall in recent years a complaint provided at the rail about the opening prayer.

"Most of what I've heard is neutral," Schenectady resident Jason Planck said about the content of each invocation. Planck, a disability advocate, has been at almost every city and county meeting for the last 12 years. "It's not in your face that Jesus is coming and you have to convert over."

Prior to 2011, the town of Malta had the Lord's Prayer recited before every Town Board meeting. The prayer, while exclusively Christian, is recognizable to many with its opening words "Our Father who art in heaven."

"It seemed like a nice way to set off a meeting to speak in a more spiritual way," said Malta Supervisor Paul Sausville. But the town discontinued the practice after an unfavorable column was published by then-Daily Gazette columnist Carl Strock. Despite the absence of public criticism, Sausville decided a moment of silence would be more appropriate.

"It seemed more keeping in the times. We don't want to offend anyone," Sausville said.

Four years ago, then-Albany Common Council member Anton Konev stirred up controversy when he proposed starting meetings with prayer. The council quickly shot it down, saying they had already debated the matter in 1999 and agreed to hold a moment of silence instead.

But those that host invocations said the minute or two of reflection — no matter what faith is represented — can be a refreshing message in what can be an otherwise mundane, and some times divisive, meetings.

Rensselaer County Legislature Chairman Martin Reid used to invite new religious leaders to do the invocation. Now, Reid, who represents Sand Lake, Nassau and Schodack, reads from the Episcopal Book of Common Prayers — a book that has a prayer for almost anything, he said.

After Sept. 11, and when legislators have lost family members, he said the invocation has proven to be a much-needed salve. "After those moments," Reid said, "it was very poignant."

The town of Saratoga doesn't do an invocation, but the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors does. And on-and-off for six years, Saratoga Town Supervisor Tom Wood has been appointed the county's chaplain to do the opening prayer. Wood, a retired shop teacher, takes his task very seriously. He crafts his personally written prayer around the events of the month, like Thanksgiving or Martin Luther King's birthday, and he said he makes a special point to not include the word 'God' in his invocations.

"If we can cause people to stop, pause and think and reflect back that life is pretty good and we need to be thankful for that and we need to do our best — I think it helps set the tone," Wood said.